In
my last essay, I wrote about Cole Porter’s possibly giving
a secondary lead in “Kiss Me Kate” a deliberately rotten song. Something
along the same lines happened when Al Jolson was preparing for his film “The
Singing Fool.” He pressured the team of Buddy DeSylva, Lew Brown and Ray
Henderson to give him a real “heartfelt” song he could sing to his
son in the film.

In his book “Jolson,” Michael Freedland
tells us that DeSylva decided to make a joke of it and they dashed off the most
banal and corny lyrics they could think of and set them to the most banal and
corny tune. They sent it to Jolson, too ashamed to deliver it themselves, and
prepared for the worst. Movie audiences broke into tears when Jolson sang it
and his recording was the first ever to sell 1,000,000 copies. The song? “Sonny
Boy.”

Another example of a star insisting on a new song right
quick comes out of the American operetta “Robin Hood.” It opened
in 1890 and nearly closed when the contralto singing the “pants”
role of Alan-a-Dale, Jessie Bartlett Davis, complained about a song she was
given and wanted another — or there would be no second performance. Composer
Reginald De Koven remembered something he had written a few years before and
gave it to her. Not only was it a success, but some say it is the only reason
the operetta achieved the immense popularity it did. The song had a life of
its own, being heard at more weddings than there have been performances of “Robin
Hood.” Composed for the wedding of Robin and Marian, “Oh Promise
Me” saw the inside of more churches than of theaters.

With a slight shift of emphasis, we have the case
of singer Kate Smith asking Irving Berlin for a patriotic song for her radio
show in 1938. Berlin had written something for “Yip Yip Yaphank”
back in 1918, but he felt then its patriotic sentiments were a bit too much
for his cast to sing as they left the theater and headed to a military transport.
In 1938, when Berlin felt that the Germans could no longer conceal their true
plans, he made a few revisions to the song; and that is the form in which Kate
Smith received it. The song was so immensely popular, that Berlin dedicated
all of its royalties to the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts of America. Surely by
now you must have guessed that we are talking about “God Bless America.”

When “A Trip to Chinatown” opened in 1891,
it did not promise to run for very long. So its creators interpolated a song
about a wide-eyed hick from the sticks seeing a lively section of New York for
the first time — and vowing never to return. It was sung by comic Harry
Conor with words by Charles H. Hoyt and music by Percy Gaunt, and the audiences
kept coming for 650 performances. Ironically, the tradesmen around that area
protested! They said that the song was designed to keep people AWAY from that
part of New York. The song? The section? Same answer: “The Bowery.”

This next tale is impossible to verify —
but if it is not true, it is at least well made up. Harry Von Tilzer was given
some highly moralistic lyrics by Arthur J. Lamb to set to music. After insisting
it be made clear that the girl in the song is the man’s wife and not mistress
(1900 morality), Von Tilzer went to a whorehouse (1900 morality) to piece out
a tune. As he progressed, he heard sobbing from behind him. Those girls not
presently engaged had been so affected by the lyrics that mascara was running
freely. If these tough cookies, he concluded, could be reduced to tears by this
song, the virgins up north would certainly go for it. Today we laugh at it along
with bustles and “getting the vapors” when an obscene word is heard.
But it is a salute to an ideal morality that has never really existed. Nevertheless,
“A Bird in a Gilded Cage” is still a classic example of a terrible
song that simply caught on.

Room for one more.

It is said that composer James Thornton spent so much
time at the piano that his wife once exclaimed, “You don’t love
me anymore.” His answer was something like; “I still love you as
I loved you when you were sixteen.” A moment’s thought, and one
of the great hits of 1898 was born! And barbershop quartets are eternally grateful.